


The Salt Lick Rebellion

by FullmetalChords



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Books, Cultural exchange, Friendship, Gen, WHOA paradigm shift, banned books, fuck da police, the kids getting woke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-27
Updated: 2019-09-27
Packaged: 2020-10-29 12:50:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20796917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FullmetalChords/pseuds/FullmetalChords
Summary: In which Claude realizes that the real final boss ofFire Emblem: Three Housesis ignorance.Written for Banned Books Week 2019. Contains heavy spoilers for Verdant Wind/Silver Snow.





	The Salt Lick Rebellion

**Author's Note:**

> [Banned Books Week](http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/banned) is just now wrapping up in the United States, and I couldn't help but think of all the books Claude has in his room, and what they might be. And what they might be used for. And what would happen if these kids ever shared with one another the information they learn throughout the course of their various routes. 
> 
> Consider this a love letter to books and learning, with some wish fulfillment for a Three Houses Good End thrown in. 
> 
> (And thanks to AceCavalier for the beta!)

Claude understands, perhaps better than anyone at Garreg Mach, how information can be weaponized.

It’s the reason he keeps so many books in his room, most of them his own private collection of books he’s purchased since coming to Fodlan just over a year ago. Books on the culture and history and religion and traditions of Fodlan, this new country he must call home. Books about farming, about fishing, about mining in each region of Leicester. Books about alchemy and chemistry, ways to synthesize poisons and medicines. Books about the noble houses of Faerghus, about the cutthroat nature of Adrestian politics.

Each new tome, a new arrow in his quiver.

It’s not as though Claude plans to do anything malicious with his new knowledge. It’s just that he already knows he’s at a disadvantage, not having been raised for leadership from birth like the other two house leaders, and he has to do all he can to make up the gap. He’s only gotten as far as he has by being clever, by understanding people and tactics and diplomacy, so what reason would he have to not learn as much as he possibly can?

It’s only a shame that Garreg Mach’s library has been so unhelpful. Claude had been thrilled, at first, to come to the academy to find scores of unread books, new information waiting to be uncovered… only to begin reading through the library’s offerings and discover the narrow worldview being presented.

The Church of Seiros is pure, righteous, infallible. Crests are the guardians of the Goddess’s will. To go against the Goddess’s will — whatever that is — is the most dire of all sins. The unbroken line of Crests are the only thing keeping Fodlan safe from the evils of the outside world. And so on, and so on.

Absolutely nauseating.

Wading through all the Church’s bullshit, Claude thinks he finally understands why the people in Derdriu had been as hostile to him as they had, when he had been named Riegan’s heir. Never mind that he happens to have a Crest of his own; the simple fact that Claude is a “savage outsider” was enough to mark him a threat to their entire worldview.

And that simply won’t do.

If Claude wants to change the world — to build the kind of world that will finally accept him — he has to start by changing minds.

—

That, in theory, is how the Salt Lick Library is born.

Well. Claude tells himself that, tells himself that it’s part of his noble ambitions. But in practice, the whole thing starts when Sylvain approaches him one evening, complaining that he’s locked himself out of his room. Again.

“You’ve gotta start carrying a spare around, man,” Claude tells him, opening his desk drawer to search for his lockpicking set. “This is, what, the third time this month?”

Sylvain laughs sheepishly, running a hand through his hair.

“Felix has my spare key,” he admits, “but I’ve gotten enough lectures from him already.”

“Fair.”

Claude’s fingers close around his lockpicks, and he straightens, ready to pick the lock on Sylvain’s door — but his neighbor is distracted by one of the many open books that litter Claude’s floor.

“What’s this?” he asks, carefully picking one up with wide eyes.

“Uh…” Claude skims the cover, then laughs as he remembers what he’d been in the middle of reading. “It’s some kind of… legend retelling, I think. Something about—”

“Loog and Kyphon,” Sylvain says slowly, skimming the pages. “And Loog’s advisor Pan… But I don’t remember this legend. Are you sure this is…?” Sylvain thumbs through the pages, which quickly fall open to an etching that Claude recalls as being… rather ribald. “Oh. Oh, wow. Oh, Goddess…”

Claude realizes, perhaps far too late, that Sylvain might not find this over-the-top erotic retelling of the founding of Faerghus to be quite as entertaining as he had.

“Sorry,” he says, grabbing to try and get the book away from Sylvain, but he snatches it out of reach before Claude can get a hold.

“Claude,” Sylvain breathes, carefully shutting the book and holding it to his chest. “Can I borrow this?”

Well. That’s a bit unexpected. Then again, it _is_ Sylvain. He must be something of a connoisseur of dirty books like this.

Claude’s mind works for a moment.

“Five gold,” he decides. “I’ll give it back to you when you return the book, provided you haven’t broken the spine or bent any of the pages.” He smirks. “Or gotten any of those etchings dirty.”

Sylvain either hasn’t noticed the innuendo, or has chosen to ignore it.

“Done.” He immediately fishes in his pocket, pulling out a handful of coins and shoving them in Claude’s hand without looking at them. “I’ll take good care of it. Thank you so much.”

And he heads out of Claude’s room without another word. Claude waits for a moment, and then—

Sylvain slinks back inside, shamefaced. “Hey, can you still help me with my…?”

“Coming,” Claude says, amused, twirling his lockpicks around one finger as he follows Sylvain to his room.

—

Claude doesn’t give a second thought to Sylvain having borrowed one of his books. At least, not until a week later when the tome in question is slammed onto the dinner table by one gauntleted hand.

Claude looks up, bemused, into the stern face of the prince of Faerghus.

“Ah, your Royalness!” he says, choosing to overlook Dimitri’s obvious irritation. “Playing delivery boy?”

Dimitri ignores Claude’s glibness.

“Please explain to me,” he says, “how this filth made its way into my house.”

Claude frowns for a moment, weighing his options.

“Sylvain borrowed it from me,” he finally says, carefully moving the book to the edge of the table, away from his dinner plate. “What he did after that was all him, I swear.”

“Ashe saw him reading it,” Dimitri says, actually sounding a bit mournful over it. “He gave it to Ingrid, who gave it to Annette and Mercedes, and then Felix took it from them and he started reading it…”

“Whoa.” Claude can’t help but laugh, surprised to hear he’d made such an impact. “Jeez. I’m sorry. If you want me to give them a safe sex book next…”

“Claude!”

“No, no, I’ll take responsibility,” Claude says, unable to keep the grin off his face. “Can’t have any lion cubs running around your house just yet, can we?”

Dimitri sighs heavily, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“Claude,” he says again, weary. “It is not the… the erotica… that concerns me. Such works about the King of Lions and his companions are slander, pure and simple. I cannot have you spreading such libel among the future leaders of Faerghus.”

Okay, that’s unexpected, especially since Claude remembers the book being somewhat cheesy, predictable, and ultimately disposable. It doesn’t seem to warrant this serious a reaction; but then again, he should have expected Dimitri to take everything far too seriously, especially if it’s related to The Great And Noble History Of The Most Holiest of Kingdoms.

He considers for a moment how best to respond.

“Did you read it?” he asks, tapping the book’s cover with a finger.

Dimitri’s cheeks burn red as he starts to splutter. “Th-that’s—!”

“So that’s a yes, then.” Claude inhales. “So you’ll know, then, that according to this book, the King of Lions had two men in his life who he loved very much. Sure, it might not be completely historically accurate, but who’s to say it is, or it isn’t? How will we ever know the truth if we blind ourselves to other possibilities?” He lets his words sink in for a moment, watching Dimitri’s expression turn thoughtful. “Also,” Claude presses on, feeling bolder, “even if it isn’t true. It was fun to read, wasn’t it? Hell, if it’s getting Felix to put down his sword for half a second, isn’t that worth something?”

Dimitri’s eyes, icy and cold, meet his for one unreadable moment.

“Just do me a favor.” He sounds slightly weary. “The next time you start spreading ‘alternative facts’ around my house, at least give me fair warning.”

And he turns to go, blue cape swishing gloriously behind him.

“Does that mean you don’t want to reenact the handcuff scene with me?” Claude calls after him, enjoying the way the prince’s ears burn even from halfway across the dining hall. Then he sighs, lovingly smoothing out the cover of his book.

That’s the end of that, he supposes.

—

Only it isn’t.

Word appears to have gotten around the entire monastery that Claude keeps dirty books in his room, and it isn’t long before a steady stream of other students — ones he’s never spoken to in his life — come to him furtively, asking to peruse his collection. And it’s not like Claude’s collection of pornography is particularly robust, but it’s certainly leagues more diverse than any of the courtly love manuals the Church keeps in its library.

It’s mostly noble students, at first, coming to ask him for a book, and so Claude feels no qualms about asking them each for five gold as insurance, as he had for Sylvain. Ironically, not all of them are as careful with his books as Sylvain was, leaving Claude a tidy bit of profit to expand his personal library with treatises on Sreng, and Albinea, and Morfis. Not a bad system, all things considered.

Then Petra arrives at his room one afternoon, her arms full of books that Claude doesn’t recognize.

“Claude,” she greets when Claude opens his door. “I am coming with gifts.”

And she crosses the threshold without further pleasantries. Claude likes that about her, how she gets directly down to business, and so welcomes her in.

“Petra,” he greets with a smile. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I am hearing that you are not having many books about Brigid,” she tells him, and unceremoniously dumps her armful of books onto his bed. “I am wanting to be… um, I want to fix this.”

Curious, Claude looks over the covers of the books she’s brought. There’s a manual on hunting techniques in Brigid, a biography of one of their most renowned archers, a few novels that look to be part of an adventure series.

“I am wanting to bring you a book of stories of our spirits,” Petra continues, sounding disappointed, “but I am not finding one. I think they may be part of the… the mouth tradition?”

“Oral tradition,” Claude gently corrects, “and you may be right. That seems to be the case with most of Duscur’s history and culture, as well.” Which, honestly, is disappointing to Claude. He’s noticed the way Dedue hovers on the edges of Garreg Mach social circles, unwelcomed by any who don’t make the concerted effort to get to know him, and thinks that their student body learning more about Duscur would only make life easier for him.

He thumbs through the biography Petra brought, already eager to read it. “Petra, I… thank you so much! How can I get you back?”

“Get me back?” Petra looks confused. “No, no, do not give them back. Am I not saying they are gifts?”

“Yes, but…” It might be rude for him to say so outright, but Claude is automatically suspicious of anything given to him without visible strings attached. And while he likes Petra, he doesn’t like the feeling that he might owe her a debt of some kind. “You can’t just give me these for nothing,” he protests.

“I am hoping that others will read about Brigid,” Petra says with a soft smile. “That is not nothing.”

“You have to let me give you something.” Claude racks his brain for a moment. “I’ll do all your chores for the next week. How’s that?”

Petra laughs. “My chores are making me stronger. It is no hardship.” Her smile fades a little. “Only, Claude. Can… can I be borrowing a book, too?”

Claude grins at her. “You don’t have to ask!” He heads over to his collection, now stacked somewhat neatly against the wall by his bed in some facsimile of a catalogue system. “What’re you in the mood for? Fiction? Nonfiction?” He winks at her. “Kink?”

Petra shakes her head.

“I am asking because I am not having money,” she says, and Claude’s stomach sinks a little. “I know that you are giving the money back if I am… if I take good care of the book, but…”

“Saints,” Claude swears at himself, clapping a hand to his forehead. He’s an imbecile. Why had he never considered that his current system might be too cost-prohibitive for the commoners at the school? No wonder all of his current clients are of noble birth.

“Petra,” Claude declares, stepping back from his book piles, “you can take any book you want, any time. That’s my thank-you for your donation.”

He’s never seen Petra’s face light up so quickly as she comes over to inspect his inventory.

“I am telling you once more, Claude,” she says, her bright eyes roving over the spines. “You are very much strange for a noble.”

Claude puffs his chest out with pride.

“Thanks, Petra.”

—

After his meeting with Petra, the floodgates truly open.

Ashe is his next visitor, tentative, clutching a gilded copy of something called _Loog and the Maiden of Wind_.

“I’ll trade you,” he says, holding out the book with shaking, reverent hands. “Petra said… she said you accept book donations, instead of coin?”

Claude’s eyes widen as he skims through the book, with its bespoke illustrations, real silver leaf adorning the helmets of Loog and his soldiers. He can’t imagine how Ashe, former thief and son of a disgraced noble house, got his hands on such a thing.

Then he makes the mistake of looking up at Ashe, taking in the sorrow in his eyes and the longing in his expression. Whatever the story is behind this book, its emotional value to Ashe must be incalculable.

“Keep it,” he decides, handing Ashe back his prize. “How about you give me a cooking lesson instead?”

Ashe becomes perhaps his most frequent “customer” after that, devouring any book Claude lends him. In return, Claude gets startlingly good at cooking roast pheasant with berry sauce, the only food he and Ashe both enjoy.

The other commoner students are quick to follow suit. Raphael trades kitchen duty with Claude for a chance to read some of Petra’s adventure books; Dorothea gives him scripts from her old operas so she can pore over some of the Almyran ballads he has from home; Leonie crafts a gorgeous new bow for him so he’ll let her read his books on gender identity.

Soon, there isn’t a student at Garreg Mach who hasn’t borrowed one of Claude’s books at one time or another. In his head, he likens his secret library to a salt lick: a place in the woods where deer and other creatures consume essential nutrients they cannot get from their diets. And honestly, with Garreg Mach’s extraordinarily narrow paradigm and its classrooms’ focus on practical combat skills instead of diplomacy or history or anything resembling critical thinking, Claude knows his classmates must be starving for any kind of information that isn’t spoonfed to them.

He knows he certainly is.

But as much as Claude enjoys lending his collection out to his classmates, it never feels like enough. He smiles whenever he sees students on campus ask Petra or Cyril to share more about their homelands, or when he hears Linhardt fervently discuss romantic and sexual attraction with Hubert, of all people. Once, he even sees Dimitri and Marianne sitting side by side with their eyes closed, breathing deeply and looking calmer than he’s ever seen either of them, one of his meditation books open between them. His heart warms, thinking of all the classmates his books must have helped even in small ways.

But it doesn’t feel like the tides are turning.

Nothing feels like his fellow classmates have developed the same hunger he has: that fervent need to uncover all the secrets the world is keeping from them. It’s nice that they’re all learning about the world around them, about topics like mental health and sexuality that the Church tends not to address.

But none of this is going to actually _change_ their world.

Then Seteth confiscates a book about the Immaculate One from the monastery’s library, claiming its ideas to be too dangerous.

And the pit of Claude’s stomach burns with the need to know why.

—

Seteth isn’t subtle at all, really. Keeping confiscated books in his office? Where _anyone_ could scale a two-story window, break the lock on its latch, and crawl inside before Seteth is any the wiser?

He makes it almost embarrassingly easy.

Only, it turns out that Claude hasn’t been as quiet as he thinks he’s been, for no sooner does he unearth the book Seteth had confiscated than his office door opens, and Professor Byleth sprints inside, stopping dead in their tracks just so they can stare reproachfully at him.

“Uh.” Claude looks down, caught red-handed with the so-called dangerous book. “I can explain this.”

Byleth snatches the book away without a word.

“Oh, come _on_, Teach!” Claude pleads. “You know Seteth’s keeping this book from us for a reason! Don’t you want to know why?” He clasps his hands in supplication. “All the stuff he and Rhea are keeping from you about your Crest, about your mom, about the freaking Immaculate One? Aren’t you tired of secrets? Don’t you just want to go digging for this stuff yourself?”

But Byleth continues staring, pitiless, wordless.

“Fine!” Claude snaps, walking out of Seteth’s office in a huff. “Who needs you anyway, Teach! I’ll just try again tomorrow!”

But as it turns out, he doesn’t need to. For no sooner has Claude arrived back at his room (ready for a good sulk and to reread his favorite tactician’s memoir over a cup of chamomile) than he notices a veritable mountain of unfamiliar books on his bed.

“How on earth did Teach get them here so fast?” he mutters to himself, walking over to examine what Byleth has brought him.

And once he realizes what these books are, his breath catches in his throat.

There are diaries here, hand-written by nobles rebelling against the church throughout history. Books about — _shock_ — other faiths besides that of Seiros, described without any demonization or fearmongering. Loose pages, singed around the edges, that have clearly been torn out of history books, all talking about heretics and the Church’s purges. And even more innocuous books like the one about the Immaculate One that Claude had found; complete, researched biographies of the saints and Elites; books about settlements in Fodlan from before the days of Faerghus or Leicester, where Crests bore little, if any, weight on the way people lived their lives.

Even, if Claude looks carefully enough, quite a few books containing secrets about the true origin of the Crests and Hero Relics. Whispers of a civilization deep underground called Agartha, a ruined nation called Nabatea.

If Claude gets caught with any of this, he’s a dead man.

He can’t wait to share it with his classmates.

—

Claude’s new books cause a veritable firestorm. Not overnight — but it’s only a week or two before there are fervent mutterings in every corner of the Academy courtyard, his classmates huddled in small knots to discuss their extracurricular readings in hushed whispers.

“So, Ferdie,” Dorothea says, smirking at her housemate, “last night I was reading all about the bloody origins of the entire system of nobility in Fodlan. Tell me, are you still proud to be a von Aegir, knowing what your ancestors did to achieve their dominance over others?”

Ferdinand has dark, tortured circles under his eyes, looking as though he hasn’t slept in weeks.

“Dorothea,” he says, sounding hollow, “believe me, had I known…”

“You’re still complicit in a system that gives you unjust power over the weak.” Dorothea tucks her hair behind her ear. “You always have been. It’s about time you checked your privilege.”

“You too, Lorenz,” says Leonie, standing at her side. “All this time you’ve been lording your _noble blood_ over us all, when in reality the only thing that makes you any different from me is not that your ancestor was brave, or heroic, but just that one time they drank another person’s blood. Do you know what that makes you?”

“A vampire,” Dorothea offers.

“A— yes!”

“No!” protest Ferdinand and Lorenz in one voice.

“Does it not make a difference to you that I have always done my best to protect and fight for the less fortunate?” Lorenz pleads. “I… may have certain privileges my forefathers won through bloody means, but I assure you, I never meant to cause further harm. Does that count for nothing?”

“Maybe,” Leonie offers, then sticks her tongue out at him. “Doesn’t mean you had to be so damned condescending about it all the time, though.”

Other whispers are taking place in the doorway of the Black Eagles’ classroom.

“I can’t believe the Heroes’ Relics are actually _dragon bones_,” Raphael says, unable to repress a shudder. “I always thought I was just imaginin’ things when Sylvain’s lance would twitch like it was alive, but now…”

“They slaughtered the Nabateans and used their bodies to wage more war.” Annette shivers, holding her arms close to her body. “Horrifying.”

“And the Crest stones are their _hearts_?” Linhardt’s face is white. “Sweet Cethleann. I’ve wanted to learn the truth about Crests all my life, but to think it’s something so… disgusting…” He covers his mouth, his skin tinged green.

“Revolting,” Dedue says, his expression even darker than usual. “To cannibalize an entire race for the sake of power, and then claim it to be the ‘goddess’s will’…”

“It’s all a lie.” Edelgard’s eyes are glowing as she speaks. “Crests, and their power… How can the Church possibly continue to defend the Crest system, knowing full well where the Crests come from?”

“What value do Crests even have?” Sylvain is scowling, the most serious anyone’s ever seen him, as Ingrid nods fervently alongside him. “If these things are going to tear families apart, force hundreds of people into a life they never wanted… And all the while, they’re the result of genocide? And the church condones them? Actively promotes their inclusion in the social hierarchy? How can we sit back and continue to be complacent in this hegemonic system that’s only ever caused suffering? How is that just?!”

The group blinks at him.

“Damn, Sylvain,” Felix says with a low whistle. “Never thought I’d see you taking anything quite this seriously.”

“Like you’re one to talk, Mr. My-Family-Intermarried-For-Generations-To-Keep-Their-Major-Crest…”

“Shut up!” Felix all but screams. “Don’t make accusations you can’t support! Where the fuck is your primary source?”

“Well, if the church condones genocide,” Linhardt says, still looking nauseated, “who’s to say it hasn’t also promoted incest…”

The church itself is being fervently debated halfway across the courtyard.

“—Why in Ailell would the Church claim any of the Ten Elites as its heroes, when they were genocidal maniacs?” Hubert smirks, though without any of his usual sadistic humor. “Utterly preposterous.”

“Why would we continue to view the Church as purely good, regardless?” Mercedes, of all people, is speaking, looking slightly sad as she does so. “It may have done good things, helped me and my family… but what of all the suffering it’s caused through the ages, too? What of all the innocents it put down for the crime of disagreeing with them?”

“Everything with the Western Church now,” Ashe says sadly, “everything they did to my brother and father… it’s not an outlier like they’d have us think. You read that merchant’s old diary too, Ignatz, you saw this has been going on for as long as the church has been around.”

“I know.” Ignatz looks lost in thought. “Guys… if the Church has been lying to us about Crests, about rebellions, about our own history… What else do you think they’ve been lying about?”

“Perhaps the Goddess is not quite so good and pure,” says Marianne quietly, and they all turn to look at her. “Or… or perhaps She never existed at all.”

Caspar scoffs.

“I’ve always known the Goddess isn’t as all-good as they say,” he says, sounding unusually jaded before he continues: “After all, if the Goddess is so great, then why did She let me diarrhea in my pants at last year’s harvest festival?”

“I beg you to stop,” Hubert deadpans.

“I believe She must exist,” Mercedes tells Marianne with a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Or at least, I don’t think there’s any harm in believing so. But it is clear that regardless of whether the Goddess is good or not… well, terrible things have been done in Her name. That’s not something I can simply condone.”

“The Church has been using its so-called 'faith' as an excuse to harm others for centuries!” A shrill voice cuts in, and they all jump to see Bernadetta standing in their midst, cheeks red and fists clenched with emotion. “To invade territories, or silence dissent, or… or to control their children! Just because they never tell us about it, or try to cushion it with a veneer of _holiness_, doesn’t mean it isn’t happening! It’s about time we all stopped being so blind to what’s been literally in front of us all along!”

Her outburst has attracted the attention of most of the courtyard, and Bernadetta stops dead with a squeak. “That is… I… please don’t look at me like that—!”

“No,” Petra says slowly, and nods at her. “You are making much sense, Bernadetta. We have been blind to this, which I fear is what they have been wanting all along.”

“The Academy is literally run by the Church of Seiros,” Dimitri muses, looking solemn. “The top school on the continent. By controlling the education of all the nobles in Fodlan, they have effectively silenced our ability to even be able to question the Church’s teachings.”

“Well,” Edelgard says, crossing her arms with a smirk as she comes to stand by Dimitri, “they haven’t controlled _all_ of our education, have they?”

Almost on cue, Claude steps into the courtyard, whistling as he crunches his way through an apple. All twenty-three of his classmates stop their discussions to look in his direction.

Claude stops in his tracks for a moment, mouth still full of apple.

“What?” He swallows. “I’m not that late to class, am I?”

“Claude,” Edelgard intones as she strides up to him, Dimitri half a step behind her. “You must take responsibility for what you started with your… secret library.”

“Gods,” Claude swears, pinching his brow. “I told all of you, if you’re going to have sex, there are safer ways to do it than just ‘leaving room for the Goddess’ like your clerics taught you…”

“Not that.” Dimitri crosses his arms. “All of those readings you uncovered about Church history, and Crests… You must have known we’d find them disturbing.”

Claude grimaces, because he _had_ known; but he’d also hoped it might change a few hearts, rather than piss off the entire student body as he challenged the very foundation of their worldview. But instead, Dimitri is facing him, as serious as he’d been when he found Sylvain carrying around historically inaccurate porn direct from Claude’s library, with the rest of the student body looking equally grim as they stand around Claude. “Disturbing” indeed — they must be furious with him for attacking all they hold dear with his words and books.

Well. Garreg Mach had been good while it lasted.

“Claude.” Lysithea is the one to speak, clenching her fist defiantly. “What do we do next?”

Everyone makes sounds of agreement around her, including Edelgard and Dimitri. Claude blinks in surprise.

“What?”

“We can’t stand by and let the Church keep getting away with this!” Annette shouts.

“Agreed! It is my duty as a von Ae… that is, as a citizen of the Empire!”

Claude looks around at them all, three nations bonding together in response to their forced ignorance, and he can’t help but feel his heart lift.

“Surely you have a scheme in mind already, yes?” Edelgard quirks an eyebrow at him.

Claude just grins.

“Well… ‘scheme’ is a bit generous. But now that you all know the truth too…”

He looks around at his friends, his allies, and nods.

“There’s only one thing left to do.”

—

When Byleth, Hanneman and Manuela arrive at their respective classrooms later that morning, they are all greeted with nothing but empty chairs.

They wonder, briefly, if an illness is going around, or if the teachers have misread their calendars; but a quick search of the school soon reveals that none of their students are in the infirmary, or the dormitory, or the training grounds, or the dining hall.

They are nowhere at all.

The Knights fear a mass kidnapping, immediately searching the place where the Death Knight had brought Flayn… and that, alone, gives Claude, Edelgard, Dimitri, and the rest of their clandestine book club the chance to walk out of Garreg Mach’s front gates, leaving behind the comforting lies of its stone walls.

They carry Claude’s books with them, the collection called the Salt Lick Library, slowly adding more and more new knowledge to their reserves as they walk. In time, each of them go on alone, north and east and south, each one with their own books, each one burning with the goal to spread, as far as they can reach, the knowledge that has been forbidden in Fodlan for over a thousand years.

It ends up being perhaps the quietest rebellion Fodlan has seen in its history. Claude was its instigator, but he is not its leader by any stretch of the word’s definition. He has no need or desire to be. Garreg Mach taught its students how to fight, but Claude and his books taught them how to _think_. And once they have learned, they all recognize, rather keenly, the urgency with which the truth must be shared with the rest of their world.

They go on. They share their wisdom, opening the eyes of commonfolk and nobles alike; they furiously debate the remnants of the old authorities, when met with resistance. When the need arises, they do battle with the Church’s armies, aided by old classmates and by those that have chosen to walk this path with them.

Slowly, as time marches on, they meet less and less resistance. The Church can suppress an isolated rebellion; it finds it is powerless against the might of three unified nations, or against the dissent that now rages in the streets of every hamlet from Enbarr to Gautier. Rhea’s denunciations of their “heresy” are deafened by the roar of the people demanding justice.

It is not Edelgard’s bloody war of reunification, nor Dimitri’s rampage of retribution. It is, perhaps, most akin to the tearing down of walls that Claude had dreamed of as a child; but even then, he could never have envisioned the impact that the simple act of sharing a book has led to.

The world they build with their own hands is one even less imaginable than the one they have grown up in. Perhaps it is a better world, and perhaps not. It is impossible to say for certain.

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Garreg Mach.

**Author's Note:**

> First person to spot the pastiche in the last scene gets a prize from your neighborhood English teacher. :P
> 
> Come and hang out with me on Twitter at @apostaroni!


End file.
